The data processing resources of business organizations are increasingly taking the form of a distributed computing environment in which data and processing are dispersed over a network comprising many interconnected, heterogeneous and geographically remote computers. Among the reasons for this approach are: to offload non-mission-critical processing from the mainframe; to provide a pragmatic alternative to centralized corporate databases; to establish a single computing environment; to move control into the operating divisions of the company; and to avoid having a single point of failure. For example, many business entities have one client/server network installed in each regional office, in which a high-capacity computer system operates as the server supporting many lower-capacity desktop computers. The servers in such a business entity are also commonly connected to one another by a higher-level network known as a wide area network. In this manner, users at any location within the business entity can theoretically access resources present in the company's network regardless of where the resource is located.
The flexibility gained for users with this type of arrangement comes with a price, however. It is very difficult to manage such a diverse and widely-dispersed network for many reasons. Servers installed in the wide area network are frequently not all of the same variety. One regional office may be using an IBM machine with a UNIX operating system, while another regional office may be using a WANG machine with a VMS operating system. Also, applications present on the servers throughout the network vary not only in terms of type, but also version number within an application type. Moreover, the applications present are changed frequently by users throughout the network, and failure events in such a network are usually difficult to catch until after a failure has already occurred.
Therefore, a need exists for a network management system that will provide an increase in automation and efficiency for network management and a decrease in the complexity of such management. Also, a need exists for a solution that is easy to implement and maintain as installed applications and computers change.